Facing Her Worst Fears
by Alexriolover95
Summary: We all know that Luna had to confront the Tantabus, but what if Luna had to face something even worse... Herself as Nightmare Moon...


**What's up bronies and pegasisters!**

 **Now before I say anything else, yes, I know my names has, "riolover" in it, but that doesn't mean I can't write for other archives! I happen to be a brony, but not a very big one, but I thought of this idea and I wanted to show it to the public.**

 **Now, we all know that Luna (My most favorite alicorn!) had to confront the Tantabus in the episode, "Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep", but what if Luna had to confront something much worse than the Tantabus, what if she had to face… Herself!**

 **And so I give you my first pony fic!**

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It was another beautiful and peaceful day in the royal city of Canterlot, ponies going about their daily business. Everyone was awake and active, everyone except for a certain alicorn princess. In one of the bigger bedrooms in the royal castle, slept a beautiful dark blue pony, Luna, who was at peace for the time being. She needed to sleep during some days when the sun was out, being the Princess of the Night and doing her royal duty when everyone had their dreams.

However… Luna was always haunted by the time when she was Nightmare Moon, how she shrouded Equestria in darkness and held her sister, Princess Celestia captive, she would have remained that evil creature if Twilight Sparkle and her new friends hadn't discovered the new Elements of Harmony and changed Luna back to her old self.

And then came the time when Luna had to confront her own creation of the Tantabus, who tortured her in her dreams and almost escaped the dreamworld into reality. Again, if Twilight Sparkle and her friends hadn't been there to help her to realize that she could stop the Tantabus, than that evil creature would have had the chance to escape to bring chaos to Equestria.

Even after defeating the Tantabus however, that lingering pain of Nightmare Moon still wore on, if there was one thing Luna feared above everything else, is that she would turn again into Nightmare Moon one day and she feared that next time she would remain that way forever.

As Luna slept that night, that very bad dream would occur…

Luna was in deep sleep, under her covers as she got into her dream. She expected something nice as usual to ease her of her pain, but she found herself in black darkness, nothing to see around her, the only light coming from the waving mane and tail of her body as she looked around her to make sense of what was happening.

"Where am I?" Luna spoke softly as she was confused by what her dreams brought her.

"Why, you are in your dreams…" A voice spoke from the darkness. "Or I should say your visions." The voice laughed evilly as Luna desperately turned her head to see where the voice was coming from.

"Who are you!?" Luna shouted. "Show yourself!"

"Oh, so eager…" The voice lowered its tone. "But I wouldn't show you my face just yet, Luna…"

"How do you know my name!" Luna shouted, becoming a bit scared. "What do you want from me!?"

"I am only here to encourage you to go back to your old self, not the good, little sister, but the powerful, terrifying Nightmare Moon!" The voice shouted and laughed again.

Luna was shocked, the voice, it was so familiar, so demonic, she didn't want to believe that her worse fears were present.

"You're… Nightmare Moon." Luna said slowly with fright.

"Very good Luna, you remember me." Nightmare Moon said as she stepped out from the darkness to appear in front of Luna, looking down at the smaller alicorn.

"No, this is impossible, you don't exist, you're only my imagination." Luna shook her head in disbelief.

"Am I?" Nightmare Moon smiled evilly. "You and I are the same, except I have yet to reemerge into the real world."

"We are not the same…" Luna said sternly. "I realized all the evil I created and I vowed to never go back down that dark path."

"Oh Luna, you are so naive and stupid." Nightmare Moon replied. "Do you really think that being one of the alicorn princesses is worth it? Why share the royal power when you can have it all?"

"It is worth it, I choose this life by my own, you will never change the way I think." Luna said, fighting to keep her tears from coming out.

"Hmmm… We'll see about that…" Nightmare Moon smirked evilly.

Suddenly Nightmare Moon flew back and out of Luna's sight, Luna ran after her to confront her and end this, only it just began. For Nightmare Moon had her means to torture Luna to break.

Luna suddenly found herself above, in the clouds, overlooking Equestria, except it was nighttime, with the moon hanging nice and bright in the sky, only it was weird looking… Bands of bright colors and a dark shape of an alicorn's head showed. It was Celestia, banished to the moon, instead of Luna.

"No…" Luna said softly. "This isn't happening."

"Oh, but it is…" Nightmare Moon's voice boomed into Luna's ear, followed by more evil laughter.

Nightmare Moon than changed the scene to one of Nightmare Moon, sitting on her sister's throne in the castle in Canterlot, except the room, which was once colorful, was now with dark colors, all the stained glass in the room were all images of Nightmare Moon's victory over Celestia.

"No! It can't be! I couldn't have done all of this!" Luna shouted.

"But, you did…" Nightmare Moon's voice boomed again.

"Stop it! I don't want anymore of this!" Luna cried.

"Oh… Does it not please you, I thought this was what you wanted all along." Nightmare Moon mocked Luna.

Luna couldn't say anything. All she did was put her hooves against her ears, to block out Nightmare Moon's voice, but it was useless, it was like Nightmare Moon was in her mind. Luna just laid down in defeat, crying her ears out as she couldn't believe this was all happening.

"Awww… Why so sad Luna?" Nightmare Moon continued on her mocking. "You should be happy."

Luna was still crying with her head in a cloud as she was so speechless and couldn't think clearly. Nightmare Moon just ignored Luna's suffering and went on.

"Well, Luna, do you want to change? Because in all your life, this is who you are…" Nightmare Moon spoke, that being the last straw for Luna.

However instead of breaking down completely, Luna suddenly got the courage to stand up to her imagination. Luna stopped crying and slowly got back up on her legs to look up at the night sky and towards her evil self.

"No… This is not who I am…" Luna spoke softly. "I'm better than this, I'm not a monster like you." Luna raised her voice higher and higher.

Nightmare Moon was taken aback a little by Luna's courage. She thought she finally was able to break Luna, she tried to quickly get back to the fight.

"I'm not the monster, everyone loves me because I bring the night to them." Nightmare Moon said in desperation.

"Everyone has no choice, because they fear you, that's not true love." Luna replied back in a determined voice. "True love comes from friendship, true love means being kind to others, something you will never understand."

Now Nightmare Moon appeared in front of Luna and now the two were facing each other again, only this time Luna was the one in charge and Nightmare Moon was the one that was afraid.

"You know nothing!" Nightmare Moon shouted, almost to the brink of tears.

"No, I know everything…" Luna said and after she finished, her horn glowed with white light.

The light grew brighter and brighter and after a few minutes Luna directed her magic at Nightmare Moon, engulfing the evil creature in the white light. Nightmare Moon was terrified as she knew she had been defeated.

"Nooooooo!" Nightmare Moon shouted as her form became smaller and smaller, her dark mane changing color into a lighter one.

When Luna stopped her spell and the white light vanished, what was once Nightmare Moon turned into a little Luna, like the Luna that was present when Twilight Sparkle and her friends defeated Nightmare Moon for the first time. The little Luna slowly opened her eyes to see her older self staring down at her with a smile. Little Luna was ashamed and covered her eyes with her hooves.

"It's okay little one, I'm not going to hurt you." Luna said softly as she placed her hoof on little Luna's mane.

"You aren't?" Little Luna replied, confused.

"No, it's not your fault, because you remind me of myself when I was your age, we are now the same." As soon as Luna said this, she walked into the little Luna and the two seemed to come together, as one pony.

After another blinding light, the only pony present was Luna. it was done, she confronted herself as Nightmare Moon and won. Luna was delighted, as she enjoyed her victory, she heard a familiar voice calling to her in the real world, it was her sister Celestia.

"Luna, are you okay?" Celestia said as she was next to Luna's bed.

Luna woke up, opening her eyes and seeing her sister with a worried expression on. Luna was confused as she saw her older sister's face.

"Yes, I am, why?" Luna asked.

"I heard you from the outside of the room and just wanted to check on you." Celestia replied.

"Oh… Well I'm fine, really, just something that happened in my dreams I guess." Luna smiled.

"Alright than, well, you better go back to sleep, we're visiting Princess Cadence and Shining Armor tomorrow in the Crystal Empire." Celestia reminded her younger sister.

"Right, goodnight, I love you sis." Luna smiled happily.

"Love you too sis." Celestia returned the smile and walked out of the room, closing the door lightly as she left Luna to sleep.

Luna snuggled up again in her covers, as now she could fully sleep at peace, without fear of her old self, Nightmare Moon, from ever appearing again.

The End.

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 **Well I hope you guys enjoyed!**

 **If you thought I could have done this differently, or better, than by all means, don't be shy, I appreciate any feedback as long as it's nice!**

 **And maybe I might make more pony fics!**


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